And now it was time to go. I could still end the night with my favorite corny Christmas movies. I could still salvage what was left of my dignity and pretend I didn’t know the end to their story.
I moved to run and instead ran straight into a ridiculously hard body. I looked up to find Finch staring down at me, his hands gripping my biceps to keep me from face-planting on the bar floor.
“Whoa, there,” he hollered over “Body Like a Back Road” by Sam Hunt. “You all right?”
Unable to help myself, I glanced at Levi one more time, but now his gaze was on me and the scene I’d nearly created. Shit. “Sorry,” I yelled at Finch. “I didn’t see you.”
Noticing the stupid tears I was trying to hold at bay, he asked, “Are you okay, Ruby?”
No. “Fine.” I gave him a wobbly smile. “Just ready to leave.”
He leaned down and put his ear near my mouth, so he could hear me. “What?”
“I’m good!” I shouted. “Just trying to leave!”
He pulled back, nodding. “Gotcha.” His gaze flicked to Levi and Kristen and then back to me, a rare look of sympathy furrowing his brows. “They’re just friends.”
The breath whooshed out of my lungs and my heart dropped to my toes. “What?”
“It’s never been her, Ruby. It’s always been you.” He pursed his lips together and then added in a soft voice I could barely hear over the roar of the crowd and deafening music, “It’s still you.”
I wiggled out of his arms, shaking my head in horror at the painful truth Finch felt necessary to share with me. A quick glance at the crowded dance floor and packed bar area revealed that it was going to take me twenty minutes to squeeze through the crush of bodies. I needed out of here now. I couldn’t breathe in this room. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t… hear those words from Finch and know them to be true in my heart and survive this torturous closeness to Levi. “I need to go,” I shouted at Finch.
He gave me a thumbs up and a frown, then helped me weave through bodies until I was back in the hallway leading to the girl’s bathroom. I rushed through the back exit, gulping in the cold, fresh air on the other side.
My heated skin immediately chilled and goosebumps broke out across my body. Two tears escaped and then froze to my cheeks almost immediately.
God, that place. I seriously needed to stop going there. I was a mom now. There was no reason for me to have a nightlife.
“Rubita,” a voice called from behind me.
Shit, not now.
I turned around and blinked at Ajax. He’d stepped outside to have a cigarette. “Oh, hey, Ajax.”
My ears felt stuffed with cotton after the loud bar and louder music. It was unsettlingly quiet out here. The snow packed ground muffled everything and the still winter night seemed empty of cars and wildlife and sound.
“You haven’t danced with me all night,” he pouted, sticking his lower lip out like a child.
“Yeah, I, uh, I’m here with some friends.” He stepped closer and I noticed how dilated his eyes were.
“I’ve missed you,amor,” he whispered, his fingers skimming over my hip. “In my bed.”
I took a step back, my ankle boots wobbling on the snowy ground. My bare toes were frozen, but I had to deal with this. Ajax didn’t even seem to notice the cold. His skin was super-heated. My smile was shaky, but I managed a regretful look. “Yeah, sorry, Ajax, I don’t think it’s going to work out between us anymore. I have Max to think about. I can’t… be casual with anyone anymore.”
He followed after me, his hand wrapping around my waist this time and tugging me against him. “That can’t be true, Ruby. You do so much for your son. You need to take care of yourself too.”
I pushed back on his shoulder, not liking how aggressively he was holding me. “Yeah, maybe, but what we had is over, Ajax. If I decide I want something, I need it to be with someone that cares about Max, that wants something permanent with me.”
He shrugged. “Then we mess around until then.”
“Stop,” I said firmly. He didn’t. He kept walking forward until my back bumped into the wood shelter of the dumpster. “Stop it, Ajax.”
“Oh, now she doesn’t want it,” he murmured to no one. “She wants a new cowboy. She’s done with the old one.”
“Stop, seriously, Ajax. We were done as soon as you started using.” He rolled his eyes. “For real.”
He shoved me against the fence and I banged my head against the rough wood. “Ow!”
